Panic during boot; scrolls by too quickly too read

[Cat Zimmermann]

I'm using a Digital AlphaPC 164LX, which I have very little experience with.

I'm trying to boot from the OpenVMS console into Digital Unix 4.0f, but there is a panic during what I think is the PCI device configuration (after a monitor resolution change), and I get a halt request with a code of 5.

Is there a way to scroll lock / pause or otherwise get a readable log of the boot process? It flashes by way too quickly.

I don't want to reinstall the OS, but I can successfully boot off the installation CD.

[Michael Schulte zur Sur]

Hi,

you can try to leave the installation procedure and then mount the system disk and look into messages.

greetings,

Michael

[Cat Zimmermann]

As I understand it, the OpenVMS console knows nothing about the filesystem on the disk, so it cannot normally write to a log.

Is it the case that once booting off the disk has started (reading vmlinux) that the boot process can write to the filesystem on the disk?

[Michael Schulte zur Sur]

The console reads the boot record and that in turn reads the next files necessary for booting. I think, you will find messages in the log. Another try could be to boot with the generic kernel in case there are new devices in the system.
b -fi genvmunix
Has this worked before?

Michael

[Cat Zimmermann]

This has booted properly in the past, and as far as I know the hardware hasn't been changed. It was out of my hands for more than 6 months, however.

I tried your suggestion, and used generic kernel genvmunix, but the same sequence of events happened.

There are at least two PCI devices that 'cannot be configured.'

It looks like I will have to do at least a partial reinstall, if such a thing is possible.

[Ivan Ferreira]

Verify that the OS_TYPE console value is set to UNIX.

>>> show OS_TYPE

>>> set OS_TYPE UNIX

Verify that the boot options are a

>>> show BOOTOS_FLAGS
>>> set bootos_flags a

Try booting the genvmunix kernel

>>> boot -fi genvmunix -fl s

If you want to see what is happening, you can connect a terminal emulator to the serial port 1 and set the console to serial

>>> set console serial

Then change it again to graphics

>>> set console graphics

[Kris Smith]

Hi Cat,

I've had this happen, but it's been a while, so bear with me. At the >>>show dev and find out your boot/root file system (I need to write them down). Now boot from the Install CD and use the shell option button. Once you have a shell prompt, mount the root file system
(#mount -t UFS /dev/rz?? /mnt)
and you can navigate to /mnt/usr/var/X11/ and modify Xserver.conf. Look for the -screen argument and set it to the appropriate monitor resolution (1280x1024). You can use the Xserver man page to verify settings and syntax. You typically won't have this problem with CDE. However, you may want to check the date on /usr/dt/config/Xsetup. This is more of a solution for the original problem.
To get the panic message you can change the CONSOLE variable to SERIAL (>>>set console serial) and you can then set the baud on the port (>>>set com1_baud 9600). You will also need to >>>init before the settings kick in. You can now connect a laptop or PC to the COM1 port of the server, set a buffer of approriate size in Hyperterm or some terminal program, and use this to boot the system and examine the messages.
I hope this helps in some way. Good luck!

Kris